


Crystal

by simplecoffee



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 'you're all I have too you know', Age Regression/De-Aging, Gen, Headaches & Migraines, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Hurt/Comfort, Tony Feels, endearments in other languages, it's not just Tony who's lost without Pepper
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-12
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-01-08 12:32:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1132691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simplecoffee/pseuds/simplecoffee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony <i>hurts<i>, and doesn't know <i>why</i></i></i>.<br/>So he hides.<br/>Of course he does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For the AvengerKink [prompt](http://avengerkink.livejournal.com/17613.html?thread=41482445#t41482445): _Deaged(~7-13yo)!Tony goes missing and everybody panics trying to find him. Turns out he has a migraine, doesn't remember ever having had one before and consequently went and hid because he thought there was something seriously wrong with him. + for extra angst: he actually hid because he didn't want to bother anyone, and/or thought they would get mad at him for being sick._  
>  Also influenced by the OP's comment on the same thread about "the 'if I'm going to die, might as well do it quietly without bothering anyone (and without anyone yelling at me)' kid logic" and how adult!Tony might still think that way (witness IM2), which broke my heart. _Goddamnit_ , Tony.
> 
> (edit: there's now a second and final chapter)

Tony's hiding in the vents.  
  
Jarvis having stayed infuriatingly silent, Clint is searching from the other end; it's Pepper, therefore, who finds him. He's curled up in the foetal position, as small as a small eleven-year-old can be, and his breathing is erratic enough to alarm her.  
  
"Tony," she whispers, pulls his shivering frame into her arms.  
  
He flinches, struggles away and retches miserably, _silently_ , bringing up nothing but water and bile. She reaches for him once it's over, slowly, carefully easing him towards her; he comes willingly enough, but he's _crying_.  
  
"Tony," she says, wiping his cheek with her thumb, "what's wrong?"  
  
He says nothing.  
  
The tears won't _stop_.  
  
"Why are you here?" she tries again, and his face instantly crumples.  
  
"I _couldn't_ ," he bursts out, sounding utterly _wrecked_ , "I _can't_ , you'll all be mad, you - I couldn't, I didn't want to make more trouble, I'm already enough, and Stark men are made of iron - " he swipes his sleeve across his eyes, but it makes no difference to the tears. "I'm - I'm sorry, I made a mess, I'll clean it up, you don't - have to worry - "  
  
" _Tony_ ," she interrupts, shocked despite herself, "you don't have to do _anything_ except _tell me what's wrong_."  
  
"Don't - don't be mad, Miss - Miss Pepper - " she can feel his resolve crack with his voice, and who'd have dreamt Tony Stark was such a painfully polite kid, even when he was sobbing brokenly into an adult's lap - "Miss Pepper, I _hurt_ , please, _please_ make it stop."  
  
"Nobody's mad at you, Tony," she says, stroking his sweaty hair and panicking, _has he been **poisoned** , why is he hurting enough to **cry** , _"just tell me where you hurt."  
  
"My _head_ ," he chokes out, and suddenly it all makes sense.  
  
 _Oh, **Tony**._  
  
Her hand must have stilled in his hair at the thought; he looks up with an effort, tears continuing to spill from his eyes.  
  
"Am I _dying_?" he says with that damn eleven-year-old gravity, and Pepper, for once, is struck utterly speechless. "Miss Pepper, am I dying, I don't _know_ , I can't remember, I can't solve, I don't - know anything, anymore."  
  
 _Well, aren't you the same old heartbreaking rambler._  
  
"You're not dying, Tony," she finally manages. "You're coming downstairs with me and we're getting some medicine into you, nobody's mad and nobody is dying today, is that clear?"  
  
"Yes, ma'am," he whispers, and she has herself an armful of shuddering child.  
  
"I'm sorry," he says again into her shoulder, and she holds him tighter and kisses his hair.  
  
(They give him children's doses of Tylenol and ibuprofen, tuck him with a heating pad under the softest blankets they can find, switch off all the lights there are, watch his angelic sleeping face, and resolve to hug his adult self close the moment they get him back.)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the wonderful [TSiLvY](http://archiveofourown.org/users/TSiLvY), who is my sunshine. I'm sorry this took so long! (You know I'm weird.)
> 
> (As always, am sleep-deprived and will proofread later.)

Pepper wakes when there's movement beside her. She doesn't remember falling asleep.  
  
Nor does she remember Natasha entering the room, but there Natasha is.  
  
Pepper, exhausted from sitting up for hours with a sick child, can only blink. The child in question, on the other hand, scrambles upright through sheer force of will.  
  
"Tony, how are you feeling?" the agent asks.  
  
"I'm better, thank you, Miss Natasha," he says softly - primly - then adds in a rush, "I can do lessons today, I promise."  
  
"I said nothing," she muses, "of lessons."  
  
Small fingers flex in the sheets beside Pepper; impossibly, Tony sits up straighter.  
  
"No, I - Miss Natasha, I can _think_ now, I'll do lessons, I'll be _good_ \- " he insists, his voice catching. "'Msorry, I couldn't. Yesterday. Was sick."  
  
"Stand down, soldier," Natasha says quietly, and Tony sags, just a little. "First, do you think you can keep down some soup?"  
  
He clenches his fist this time, hangs his head, small shoulders slumping in defeat, and whispers, "No, ma'am."  
  
Natasha sets her jaw and reaches out, lightly touching his sweat-drenched hair.  
  
"Crackers, then," she says, "you have to eat something; Jarvis' orders."  
  
Tony manages the ghost of a smile, fist slowly relaxing, and accepts a cracker to nibble on. In return, Natasha doesn't press him when he says he's had enough.  
  
She's as surprised as Pepper is when he leans hesitantly into her side. She does, however awkwardly, though, slip an arm around him. Natasha's come a long way. Pepper is so proud.  
  
"Miss Natasha," he ventures, pleading. " - I meant it, I really can do lessons. I can do math, I'm good at math - " he closes his eyes, deflates a bit. "Or I could do Latin, or anything, I - I've wasted enough time, Miss Natasha."  
  
Natasha's face is blank, eyes hard in the moonlight filtered through the curtains. "No one doubts you _can_ , but you _need_ not, little one."  
  
"But I'm behind a day _already_ ," he says - _doesn't protest the epithet_ , and Pepper can't take this any more.  
  
" _Tony_ ," she says, dragging herself further awake, "you don't have to do lessons, not till you're _better_ \- "  
  
Tony starts at the sound of her voice, whips around in sudden panic. Slams his eyes shut, clamps a hand to his mouth, _coughs_ , and Pepper reaches for him, rubbing gentle circles into his back as he shakes. He's going to start protesting again, she feels it in his breathing, and she plays the meanest trick she has: she presses a kiss to his temple. He clings.  
  
Pepper knows firsthand how this ends. She's seen it, seen him pretend a hangover while Obie snapped and raged, seen him dazzle the press then collapse in the wings, seen him shivering in his office with his tie clutched to his eyes, and she knows, inevitably, how it ends. It ends exactly as last night began: in panic and hiding and puking and tears.  
  
Natasha, too, knows how it ends. Immediate danger of throwing up averted, she helps ease the child down as he quiets, as Pepper sinks back against the pillows.  
  
"Tony," the agent says, gently but firmly, "there is no shame in being unwell."  
  
Tony's breath slows.  
  
Natasha continues, "Nor is there any in taking rest until you're well enough to work again."  
  
There's no reply, but they expected none. Natasha lets the subject go and settles him with a heating pad; he clutches it to his stomach with a tiny, helpless whimper, and Pepper feels her heart constrict in her chest.  
  
Natasha strokes his hair, murmurs something to him as Pepper drifts; it sounds vaguely un-English, and he gives the slightest of sobs in reply. Pepper wants to kiss the pain lines from around his eyes, wants to kiss away this frightened child and find her own Tony in his place, to hold her own Tony in her arms and banish the frightened child within him.  
  
She reaches out to hold his hand; he _lets her_. Lets her anchor herself, as she so often has, by his engineer's fingers. Lets her reassure herself he's real, that he won't slip away once her back is turned.  
  
Lets her help, even as they both fall.  
  
*  
  
She wakes to a familiar weight, familiar warmth beside her, to a familiar tousled, aching head tucked firmly underneath her chin.  
  
Tony - her Tony - starts awake when she shifts; she feels his breathing quicken, feels him clutch at her sides, and is swift to smooth her hands along his back. He gasps - presses his forehead to her neck, shivers once, and Pepper plays a hunch.  
  
" _Sei a casa, mio caro_ ," she whispers into his hair, and Tony calms.  
  
*  
  
"Pep," he coughs one morning, months later, "I'm fine. I can do this, I can work."  
  
She sits down beside him, pinning him under the covers, and says, "Hey. There's no shame in resting when you're sick."  
  
(Then softly adds, " _Tesoro_ ," and watches him melt.)


End file.
